


Throwing Elbows

by elicitillicit



Series: Assorted Drabbles and Shorts [13]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 10 points if you can spot the Mulan reference, Alternate Universe - Military High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Basically trash I'm sorry, Cadet Black, Captain Evans, F/M, Rare Pairings, ReguLily, but ReguLily Amiright
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-29
Updated: 2015-09-29
Packaged: 2018-04-24 00:09:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4897618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elicitillicit/pseuds/elicitillicit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Regulus is trailing morosely after Sirius and isn’t watching where he’s going, which is how he ends up flat on his belly with three girls piled haphazardly over his back and another standing heavily on his left hand.</p><p>There’s a grunt of exasperation, followed by the shrill blast of a whistle and a series of barked orders. Regulus pays none of this any mind, being focused on trying to breathe without moving his ribs too much because jesus fucking christ people are heavy, so the sudden disappearance of the weight on his spine and the well-placed nudge with a sneakered foot that rolls him over comes as a complete surprise.</p><p>The sky is bright and blue before it’s completely obscured by a girl’s face, heavily freckled and incredibly irritated.</p><p>“Are you alive?” she demands, and Regulus bobs his head dumbly in assent while part of him (the part that’s mesmerised by the green glitter of her eyes and the stony set of her lips) is screaming 'have I lived before this moment'?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Throwing Elbows

Regulus is trailing morosely after Sirius and isn’t watching where he’s going, which is how he ends up flat on his belly with three girls piled haphazardly over his back and another standing heavily on his left hand.

There’s a grunt of exasperation, followed by the shrill blast of a whistle and a series of barked orders. Regulus pays none of this any mind, being focused on trying to breathe without moving his ribs too much because  _jesus fucking christ_ people are  _heavy_ , so the sudden disappearance of the weight on his spine and the well-placed nudge with a sneakered foot that rolls him over comes as a complete surprise.

The sky is bright and blue before it’s completely obscured by a girl’s face, heavily freckled and incredibly irritated.

“Are you alive?” she demands, and Regulus bobs his head dumbly in assent while part of him (the part that’s mesmerised by the green glitter of her eyes and the stony set of her lips) is screaming  _have I lived before this moment_? 

“Have you maimed my brother, Evans?” Sirius’s head - much less welcome - looms over him, and Regulus winces for him when the girl -  _Evans_  - plants a palm firmly over his sternum and  _shoves_. Sirius tumbles backwards onto his ass, screeching about grass stains. 

Regulus sits up, still a little winded, and tries not to squirm under the scrutiny of a knot of furious harpies decked out in PT kits. “Um. I’m sorry?” he mumbles, and tries really hard to ignore the fact that Evans is still crouched so that her boobs are pretty much almost in his face.

She sniffs, narrows her eyes at his brother, who is cursing comfortably while overtly checking out the legs of every girl within a fifteen foot radius, and gets up. “Look both ways before crossing the track,  _cadet_ ,” she snarls, and then she’s jogging ahead of them, shouting for her squad to  _catch the fuck up_.

The sun glints off her hair and sets it ablaze, and Regulus is pretty sure that he’s in love.

* * *

 Regulus’s squad leader is a sophomore named James Potter. Potter is tall, athletic, not bad looking (Regulus privately thinks that _he’s_ rather more handsome, though), and is  _obsessed_ with Lily Evans.

Crouch and Mulciber spend the entire first month rolling joints and plotting malicious mayhem, which Potter misses entirely because his head is either in his ass or fixed in the direction of Evans’s. Snape cuts himself down from where he was suspended upside down from his own bunk, Avery filches a double handful of band-aids from the medical bay and refuses to say what for, and Moody now only drinks from a canteen that he doesn’t let go of. Ever.

At least, Regulus  _thinks_ that Potter doesn’t know until he overhears him telling the Torture Twins to  _please_ just not send anyone to the medical bay because then he’d have to write a _report_ and  _file_ it. 

And Regulus is just.  _Ugh_.  _This_ is the person whom his brother spends every waking moment talking about? 

So, yeah. Potter is a  _shitty_ squad leader. 

It seems that the only time that Potter  _ever_ really pays the boys in his care any attention is during PT -  _especially_ when Evans and  _her_ squad are in the vicinity. 

Especially when Evans and her squad are high-key  _competing_ with them. 

Potter and Evans are standing on opposite sides of Obstacle Course D, roaring at their fumbling new cadets as they scramble up ladders and leap from platform to platform and crawl under nets weighed down with bits of metal and basically engage in a flat-out mudfight. 

“C’mon, you  _pussy_ -” Potter hollers at Avery, and Evans is almost  _incandescent_ with rage because  _what the actual fuck our vaginas are not swear words or vernacular for weakness, Potter, you fucking were birthed from a woman whose vagina had to be fucking_ **cut open and sewn back together** _, ok, **jesus christ-**_  

\- And then she screams “Did they send me sons when I asked for daughters?” at a tiny, frightened little girl who trips and almost tumbles into a mudpit, and Potter smirks and says  _want to show me your dick, Evans?_

Regulus throws himself into the mud to avoid getting hit by a crowbar that Evans has miraculously procured and flung at Potter. Fenwick, who’s beside him and staring wide-eyed at Evans on a rampage, makes a worshipful sound in his throat. 

Regulus is inclined to agree. 

* * *

Of course, it’s Evans who discovers him in the middle of the night, half naked and duct-taped to one of the flag poles on the parade square. 

She looks much younger out of uniform, with her hair loose like a cloud around her shoulders and her expression  _not_ contemptuous. She is, however, moving furtively from shadow to shadow, and he’s not sure whether he should call out a friendly  _hi_ when she catches sight of him and clamps a hand over her mouth to stifle a squeak. 

“Black the Second?” (Regulus nods gravely.) “Who  _did_ this to you?” 

Regulus shrugs as best as he can with his entire torso immobilised. “Two of my squad mates.”

“Should I, um, get you out?” 

Regulus tries to shrug again, gives up on it, and shakes his head. “Nah. They’ll leave me alone after this. It’s cool.” 

“It’s  _hazing_.” 

Regulus sets his jaw, and she sighs irritably before heading to the flagpole beside his and beginning to lower the flag as quietly as she can. His eyebrows snap together in confusion. “What are you doing?” For the first time, he notices the bundle of cloth she’s got tucked under her armpit. “What are  _those_?” 

Evans grins and dumps the bundle in to a pile on the floor, brandishing a pair of boxers and a clothespin. “The girls and I did a panty raid.” 

“That’s  _Potter’s_ ,” Regulus points out, and hopes to  _god_ that it hadn’t been  _his_ dorm that was raided. 

“Um?” She shifts her weight from foot to foot. “No; I took this from under your  _brother’s_ bed.” 

Regulus has an extremely vivid memory of James Potter walking around their dorm in that pair of stag-print boxers, reciting their school pledge in Latin whilst high, so he’s pretty sure that he isn’t wrong. 

But, come to think of it, Sirius stealing Potter’s underwear really would explain a lot. 

Evans makes the connection and blanches, drops the boxers, picks up a pair of briefs in lieu, and begins affixing it to the line, right below their school flag. 

“I suppose I don’t have to ask you not to say anything about this,” she says, not looking at him, and Regulus nods again, fervently, before saying  _oh-ok-sure-of-course-anything_. 

She glances over at him and smiles - and this is the first time he’s seen her smile like _that_ and it feels like he’s been hit over the head with one of Crouch’s vintage baseball bats - and he can’t help but beam back at her in return. 

When the last pair of underwear (barring Potter’s, which lies crumpled in an ignominious ball on the ground) has been affixed to the line and the flag hoisted back up, Evans turns back to him, suddenly serious. 

“Does Potter know? About the hazing?” 

Regulus flushes, because you’re not supposed to tell, because, y’know, _badge of honour things_ , but Evans gathers as much from that reaction. 

“Mmm,” she says, and leans in and brushes her lips against his cheek. 

Regulus turns bright red and  _everything_ springs to attention.

“To keep you warm until the morning,” she explains, smirking, and slips away into the night. 

* * *

Regulus  _still_  has to spend a week in the medical bay to deal with the cold that he caught after being trapped outdoors in his pyjamas for eight hours in October.

Evans visits, with chocolate, and informs him that Potter has been demoted from squad leader. His new IC is a junior named Malfoy who’s apparently  _scary as fuck_ , but Regulus doesn’t give a shit about school, because Evans kisses him goodbye on the nose, now. She also tells him he’s adorable because he’s high on flu meds like eighty percent of the time and blurts out things like  _I love you_ and  _no for real you set me on **fire**_. 

She doesn’t reply to all of that, but she  _does_ steal a pair of his boxers and wears them to sleep at night, so Regulus reckons that his life is pretty much  _made_. 


End file.
